Euripides, Andromache
David Kovacs, Ed.

Chorus Leader
Lady, to the extent that you are able to without vexation, to that extent be ruled by me and come to some agreement with her words.

Hermione
Why do you take this high and lofty tone and enter into a contest of words with me, [235] maintaining that you are chaste while I am not?

Andromache
Is it not because of the very arguments on which you take your stand?

Hermione
May your way of thought never come to dwell with me, woman!

Andromache
You are young and you speak of shameful things.

Hermione
You do not speak them but do them against me with all your might.

Andromache
[240] Will you not suffer your marital troubles in silence?

Hermione
What? Is not this the first interest of women everywhere?

Andromache
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Hermione
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Andromache
Yes, for those who make the proper use of it. Otherwise, it is not proper.

Hermione
We do not live here with barbarian customs.

Andromache
What's shameful is shameful, here as well as there.

Hermione
[245] You're clever, clever. Yet you have to die.

Andromache
Do you see Thetis' image, looking at you?

Hermione
Yes, hating your country for the death of Achilles.

Andromache
Helen ruined her, not I: it was your mother.

Hermione
So you go on alluding to my woes?

Andromache
[250] I'm silent and hold my tongue, just as you wish.

Hermione
Say now the words I came to you to hear.

Andromache
I say you do not have the sense you ought.

Hermione
This sacred shrine of the Nereid, will you leave it?

Andromache
If promised I'll not be killed: otherwise never.

Hermione
[255] My mind is fixed. I shall not wait for my husband.

Andromache
But neither will I surrender before he comes.

Hermione
I'll set you on fire, paying your state no heed.

Andromache
Burn on! The gods will know who is to blame!

Hermione
I'll cut your flesh with dread and painful wounds.

Andromache
[260] Bloody the goddess' altar! She'll pursue you.

Hermione
O barbarian creature, bold as brass, do you hold out against your death? Yet soon without force I shall raise you from this seat: such is the lure I possess to entice you. But I will say [265] no more, the event will soon make all plain. Sit on! For even if molten lead all about you should hold you fast, I shall make you get up before Achilles' son comes, in whom you trust.Exit Hermione into the house.

Andromache
Yes, in him I trust. It is monstrous that while some god has given us a cure [270] for the bites of the snakes of the wild, no one has yet found the specific against a woman [a bad one: such a bane we are to mankind].